Shirley Polykoff

EARLY CAREER

Shirley Polykoff learned at a young age about discrimination. In order to help lessen the family's financial strain, at age twelve Shirley was determined to get a summer job following her first year in high school. She applied to be a file clerk, but found later her application was passed over as a result of her religion. At her next interview, Shirley Polykoff became "Shirley Miller," whose religion was Christian Science. She got the job (Polykoff, 1975).

Shirley Polykoff later landed a job at Harper's Bazaar (Polykoff, 1997). She started out as a secretary to the Circulation Manager making $23 a week, which was typical pay during the Depression era (Cummings, 1985). In an attempt to "save the day," Ms. Polykoff found herself writing a time-sensitive advertisement, for which she ended up getting fired rather than praised.

As Ms. Polykoff tells the story, it was the day before a holiday in the office, so everyone but her had already left for the day. Just as she was preparing to leave herself, Good Housekeeping called to request the Harper's ad for their October issue, which was about to close. If Good Housekeeping didn't receive the copy that day, Harper's ad wouldn't run in the issue. Ms. Polykoff stepped in and wrote the ad. Unfortunately, she incorrectly spelled three authors' names that appeared in the ad and, thus, was fired for the inaccuracies rather than praised for her initiative and responsibility. She vowed to "show Harper's Bazaar... by becoming the best copywriter around" (Cummings, 1985).

In order to find a job to replace Harper's, Ms. Polykoff visited the advertising departments of large retail stores. She created a book of ads that were currently running, but provided substitute copy in place of the original copy - copy of how she thought the ad should have been written (Cummings, 1985). She soon began to notice that as a blonde woman with a nice figure, she could easily get interviews. To her disillusionment, some ad directors weren't even concerned with her ability to write.

Ms. Polykoff was eventually hired by a store run by four bachelors, who had the reputation of being "fast" with the ladies. Although she had her suspicions regarding their intentions, she new the rules of "Russian roulette, Brooklyn-style." If she succumbed and went out with one of the bachelors, the other three would get her fired. So, she began as a writer with full intentions of staying employed. Her starting salary was even less than what she earned at Harper's - $19 a week. However, based on her work, she received pay increases and was earning $85 a week by the end of her first year (Polykoff, 1975). Shirley Polykoff liked writing copy for retail because of the urgency in the copy, and because of the timeliness in determining whether the ad was "pulling" or not.

She subsequently established herself as a "star" in retail advertising, first for department and variety stores, including Bamberger's and Kresge in Newark, then for various New York agencies with retail accounts (Thomas, 1998). Ms. Polykoff's first agency job was with Peck Advertising, where she worked for 10 years. From there she went to a smaller agency that specialized in retail and manufactured shoe brands. In order to keep the brands separate in her mind, she gave each shoe account its own personality (Cummings, 1985). Ms. Polykoff always approached her copywriting as if every woman's dreams were similar to her own. This assumption guided her creative voice and lifelong advertising career (Polykoff, 1997).

Her next move was to Foote, Cone & Belding in 1955, where she truly flourished. In the twenty-year interim between Harper's Bazaar and Foote, Cone & Belding, Shirley Polykoff's life moved along two clearly defined paths - one headed toward marriage, and the other toward realizing herself in a job, as a man might, if she had been born the boy her mother wanted (Polykoff, 1975).

~ Home ~ Table of Contents ~ Introduction ~ Family Life ~
~ Early Career ~ FC&B ~ Clairol ~ Miss Clairol Ads ~ S.P. Advertising ~
~ Ad Collection ~ Honors ~ Conclusion ~ Bibliography ~